LIMRA panel to share plans to win the ‘war for talent’

Attracting and retaining talent was already a major issue in financial services long before the COVID-19 pandemic caused major disruptions.

In the two-plus years since, social and economic factors have escalated concerns to near-crisis levels. LIMRA will discuss all of these issues during the panel session titled "Winning the War for Talent" today at its 2022 Annual Conference.

"What we'd really like to do is share with the audience what has been learned, both through successes and failures," said Sean O'Donnell, senior vice president for member relations for LIMRA and LOMA. "And try to get a peek around the corner at what we think will evolve from where we are today, given the trends that have really emerged and emerged relatively quickly."

The panel includes Janet Castricum, director of executive development for LIMRA and LOMA; Cissy Williams, executive vice president and chief operations office for Protective Life Corp.; and Kim Waller, senior client partner for organizational strategy and DEI at Korn Ferry.

LIMRA leads effort

Earlier this year, LIMRA unveiled "The People Imperative," an effort aimed at providing members with survey data, best practices and other information on successful recruitment and retention.

"Throughout the year, we've been tracking talent challenges around attracting entry level talent, retaining that talent, retaining specialty functions, how to develop a changing workforce, and address these ongoing changes that have been popping up," O'Donnell explained.

Via the initiative, LIMRA researchers are delving into the issues and exploring recruitment and retention strategies that are working. That topic is expected to be a primary focus of the session.

An August Deloitte survey found that 82.3% of hiring managers at public companies expect they’ll have to work hard in the next year to attract and retain accounting and financial employees. Likewise, 73.7% of hiring managers at private companies concurred.

LIMRA's research is showing that employees want recognition, opportunities and flexibility:

"A lot of this is leading companies to truly, truly re-evaluate their employee value proposition and not only how they are extending and communicating that value proposition, but also how are they delivering on it?" O'Donnell said. "How are candidates experiencing it and getting a sense of it early on? How are the existing employees experiencing it and how it is contributing to their mindset and outlook?"

Diversity an issue

Two factors that were either not on the radar, or not as visible prior to the spring of 2020, are at-home work and diversity of staff. Many companies have embraced at least a hybrid work environment where employees work from home part of the time. Other companies allow employees to work from home permanently.

Surveys show that employees value that flexibility and it can be a factor in talent retention.

Financial services companies began robust diversity, equity and inclusion efforts almost immediately following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020. Those efforts remain important to employees and are ongoing, LIMRA surveys show:

"Whether it's generational diversity, gender diversity, racial diversity, identity diversity, it is about inclusion and I think that's where companies really need to be thinking about how they extend and embody that inclusion," O'Donnell said. "It's a critical part of any conversation."

InsuranceNewsNet Senior Editor John Hilton has covered business and other beats in more than 20 years of daily journalism. John may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @INNJohnH.

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